Attempting to Define Personality

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The term personality is derived from the Latin word persona, which means mask. Personality is the public image of self. It is the attribute that is visible to the world. This aspect of personality implies that the vital attributes of an individual remains concealed for various reasons. Personality enables a person to be socially viable meaning that an individual might possess a very good personality or a bad personality or no personality at all. Thus, several definitions of personality exist. There is no perfect way to define personality. Personality in totality has to do with the differences that exist within individuals which may be in behavior in thinking pattern and in emotional outbursts. There are various theories of presented by theorists which is based on their own studies and projections. Personality is a dynamic organization, inside the person, of psychophysical systems that create the person’s characteristic patterns of behaviour, thoughts and feelings(G.W. Allport, 1961). The way a person thinks, behaves and acts can be defined as personality. The study of personality focuses on two broad areas: the first study involves the understanding of individual differences in particular personality characteristics, which may be sociability or irritability. The second study involves understanding how the different attributes of an individual come together as a whole. The internal process that guides behavior is personality. Gordon Allport (1961) makes the point that personality is psychophysical, which means both physical and psychological. There is biological as well as genetic phenomena involved to impact personality. Child(1968) makes the point that personality is stable – or at least relatively stable. One does not change a... ... middle of paper ... ...umans’ trait is concerned with the differences between the individual. in order to describe the components of human nature and the characteristics on which humans differ it is considered as one’s achievement; to explain one’s origins, how they interact, how they change over time, and their functional significance it is another. In order to describe what humans are like and to explain why one is like that is the goal of personality. It actually describes and explains the human nature as well as differences between individuals. There are different theories that emphasize upon the various aspects of human nature and individual differences, and offer different descriptions, explanations, and methods for studying them. the best understanding of personality can be best understood by providing by the composite of many theories of personality instead of one single theory.

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